Botanical Writings of Rafinesque. 229 



proposes to reestablish the genus Sarotha " and to compose it of 

 all the Hypericums, which have few stamens and an unilocular 

 capsule, .... and to divide the genus Monotropa into two, re- 

 establishing the old genus Hypopythis ; and both shall form a 

 separate natural order or tribe, under the name of Monotropeous." 

 Here we have the order or sub-order Monotropea?, indicated ten 

 years before its publication by Nuttall. In a short list of some 

 species to be distinguished from allied ones of Europe, he proposes 

 Erythronium angustatum, for the E. Dens-canis of early Amer- 

 ican authors ; Trientalis borealis, for T. Europmis, of the same ; 

 Lysimachia capitellata, for L. thyrsiflora, Michx. ; and Vibur- 

 num edulum for F. opulus, Michx. ; in which cases, except per- 

 haps the first, he has anticipated other botanists. In other in- 

 stances he has made mistakes ; he proposed V. lentagoides for the 

 American F. Lentago, forgetting that Linnasus established the 

 species on au exclusively American plant ; and his Asclepias fra- 

 grans for the American A. Syriaca is in the same predicament. 

 The second part of the essay is occupied with Fungi, and sev- 

 eral new genera are proposed ; upon which we have no observa- 

 tions to offer. 



Ten new genera are proposed and characterized in the second 

 essay, which follows the former. 1. Phyllepidium (squarrosum,) 

 said to be an Amaranthaceous plant, found near Baltimore; we 

 do not recognize it. — 2. Schultzia (obolarioides,) sa.id to be "very 

 near akin to Obolaria," is undoubtedly the plant itself — 3. Bur- 

 shia (humilis,) which is Myriophyllum ambiguum. The ge- 

 nus is dedicated to Pursh, but the orthography is incorrect. — 4. 

 Diphryllum (bifolium,) is the same as Listera, of Brown, and 

 much older ; but in a later memoir the author insists that it is 



of Pontederia, but it is the original species of that genus. Macrotys (here written 

 Macrotrys,) which afterwards Rafinesque changed, without reason, to Botrophis, al- 

 though still adopted by some good botanists, is too near Cimicifuga. Spathyema(= 

 Symplocarpus, of Salisbury. Achroanthes is long anterior to NuttaWs Microstylis. 

 Kraunhia is also anterior to Wistaria, or Thyrsanthus ; but Rafinesque seems ever 

 after to have overlooked the name ; and in the Journal de Physique, he states that 

 he had called it Savia, forgetting, probably, that his Savia (posterior to Willdo- 

 now's) is the same with Elliott's Ampkicarpma. Apios forms the third instance, in 

 this list, in which Rafinesque has proposed new genera upon the same plants and 

 under the same names as Moench had done fourteen years before ! Triadenium= 

 Elodea of Adanson. Hingstonia=Fer6e«MO, Linn. Goaolheca^^ Tetragonotkeca, 

 Linn. Trachysperma=Li)renffinfAemKm, Grael. 1769. 



Vol. XL, No. 2.— Jan.-March, 1841. 30 



